Maybe the city should save itself $5 billion and scrap the NYPD altogether.

Sure, that would endanger lives.

But why spend money on police if critics — from the City Council to wannabe-lawmaker judges — are only going to slap the cuffs on the cops?

At the moment, the NYPD faces three (yep: three) major lawsuits and a mountain of legislation all aimed at deep-sixing its wildly successful stop-and-frisk program.

What the critics seek, in a nutshell, is control of the NYPD itself.

And even if the council or judges don’t appoint themselves police commissioner, there’s still trouble ahead: The winner of next year’s mayoral race might well order cops to stand down — ceding the streets to the thugs.

Never mind that Commissioner Ray Kelly has already made considerable reforms to address stop-and-frisk criticism. (Hey, Ray: Did you really think a show of good faith would make any difference? Ha!)

Never mind that folks who benefit from the program think it’s a godsend — folks like Consolato “Joe” Cicciu, for example, and his tenants.

Cicciu’s nonprofit owns several low-income buildings in The Bronx where groups of young men regularly loitered, blocked entrances and engaged in who-knows-what — until he signed up for the NYPD’s “Operation Clean Halls.”

That program, the target of one of the lawsuits, lets cops enter buildings with a landlord’s OK, question shady characters and, if need be, frisk them.

Once cops began showing up, Cicciu says, his properties changed overnight — for the better. And he received not one complaint, by the way, from any of the residents in his 1,883 enrolled units.

Indeed, the only “criticism” he hears is: “Why don’t [cops] come more often?”

Meanwhile, New York’s leftist judges also see it as their mission to undermine cops.

Just recently, for example, the state’s top court refused even to hear an appeal of rulings that let two teens, in separate cases, walk free — after being caught red-handed with loaded guns.

Cops had watched the teens, Darryl Craig and Jaquan Morant — then both 14 — acting suspiciously. After questioning the two, officers found loaded handguns on them.

Both were convicted, but appellate panels overturned the convictions, claiming the cops lacked “reasonable suspicion” to search them.

One judge said an arresting officer acted on “a mere hunch.” Again, the searches in both cases turned up loaded handguns.

If that isn’t proof the cops took wise action, we don’t know what is.

Truth is, the officers deserve medals — and the kids, time up the river: Three months after Craig’s arrest, he was charged (surprise!) with attempted murder, after shooting someone.

Meanwhile, who knows where the stop-and-frisk lawsuits will lead? New York courts have taken over the Fire Department, homeless services, budgets, special-ed classes — you name it.